Life in West Marin seen through the eye of a needle

Menu

felting

Hello Makers! West County Fiber Arts in Sebastopol will be hosting once again a felting class! I hope you can join me on this new journey. I will be teaching a Hat Making Class using a resist that will allow to create shapes, textures and to add your personal and special touch to your project. I will show how to design a hat from scratch. We will be starting by making our own pattern using our own measurements. It’s going to be a lot of fun!

You will be surprised at how many options there are when designing a hat. Lately, I’ve been immerse into hat making just because it is fun and to also have a few examples to show to my students for inspiration.

This is a hat that was ALMOST a failure! It was meant to be a rose, but instead it became something weird that started to look like a lump. Or perhaps a nipple?

I didn’t liked it at all! It looked somehow disturbing. So I decided to perform surgery with a pair of scissors.

This is much, much better. I’m thinking of adding some design elements with a sewing machine.

As I said… This can be a journey! If you are interested on taking my class, follow the link below for more information and registration.

Working on a color palette can be difficult for me because I always tend to use every possible color combination on one garment, but I think I finally settled on a few colors and I’m liking it. I also love the drape of the 5mm silk chiffon.

This dress isn’t quite finished yet. Still needs color, straps and some adjustments here and there. Hmm… I might even add some beads to it. But, I’ve been missing blogging. It has been a fun and busy summer with some up and downs. Heck, if it wasn’t for the downs, I wouldn’t be having the ups, right? Nothing too extreme, but when it comes to computers problems, it can turn your life quite miserable, especially when all that I want to do, is be outdoors.

By the way, the jewelry has been designed by moi. I’ve been having a ride making jewelry again. It deserves a later post.

Lastly, yesterday, my friend Charmaine and I went to visit my friend Mimi and came back home with a nice fleece with lots of curls and I want so badly to make something totally different this weekend…

I had to admit, at some point I felt a little panic during the production of this dress (just a little). I tend to think about too many “what if’s” and I have to remind myself that I will be fine. I was checking my emails a few days ago, and the first email from The Mother of the Bride was on October last year. I met her in December and I agreed to design her a dress for her daughter’s wedding. Talking about a little pressure, right? I worked on it really slow and I took my time before walking to the next step. I guess I take dyeing for granted (since that’s what I generally do almost each week), because when I realized that it was the time to dye the dress, again my “what ifs” started to go around my head again. I don’t have a lot of experience with indigo. My friend Charmaine kindly spent an afternoon with me showing how she prepares her vat. So, I was on my own and I had to dye the dress with Indigo. I took my notes, and started my first indigo vat. So, one cold afternoon, I held my breath and I dipped the white dress in a stinky dark liquid hoping that the magic would do its trick for me… And it did!

The reds from the cochineal turned purple, the yellows from the Osage Orange turned green and the white wool and silk turned blue.

The making of this dress tought me a few things. One of them was feeling ok with using buttons to fasten the garment. And the other lesson I learned is being p-a-t-i-e-n-t!

Follow my blog

Copyright

All the material in this blog is Copyrighted. Please refrain from using any of the content of my blog without my authorization, using it without my consent is considered theft and it will be prosecuted with all the extent of the law.